Seiten

Samstag, 17. November 2012

Knit yourself an attractive accessory to keep your hands warm this winter. The Mixed Wave Mitts have an intriguing graphical design - while knitted all in garter stitch.

These fingerless gloves have the same basic construction as the Short Wave Mitts that I published a while ago, i.e. a shaped thumb part that is knitted first, followed by a rectanguar main part build from short row sections interspersed with garter stitch rows of a different colour.

I wondered what it would look like, if the short row sections (that added up so nicely to a rectangle) were knitted in a different order – I thought that it might make the mitts more „organic“ … and it worked.

The pattern for Short Wave Mitts depends on stacking sections of short rows in a very strict (nearly mathematical) order – B5 , B4, B3, B2, B1, F1, F2, F3, F4, F5 – as shown in the drawing.
Here, the sections called B1-B5 are backwards leaning sections and F1-F5 are forwards leaning ones.

Together with two full length garter stitch rows of a different colour the end result will look like this – i.e. a rectangular piece of knitting or the Short Wave Mitts (published a while ago).

However, when changing the order of the sections in a different order they should still add up to a rectangular shape.

So, how does it look if the sections are knitted in a different order,
e.g. B1, F5, B2, F4, B3, F3, B4, F2, B5, F1

Non-Standard Abbreviations
Basically, the abbreviations used here are standard knitting abbreviation, e.g. as used by knitty or other magazines (here's a link to their abbreviation list) - except the following:

Part 2 - The Short Row Part
Pick up 49 stitches from the right hand side of the mitt by inserting your needle into the front part of the slipped stitch of each row from back to front without using your working yarn.

With MC knit one row (i.e. k5 pm (called m1) k10 pm (called m2) k10 pm (called m3) k10 pm (called m4) k10 pm (called p5) k to end)
Change to CC1: Select a backwards leaning section and knit it (see „The F- and B-sections“ below)
With MC: knit two rows
With CC2: Select a forwards leaning section and knit it (see „The F and B-sections“ below)
With MC: knit two rows (exception: after the last F-section, knit only one row)
Repeat this until you have done all B-sections and all F-sections
– each section should be knitted once!

Samstag, 3. November 2012

Since some people had problems regarding different parts of the pattern, the following explanations & illustrations can hopefully clear up some of these.

How to pick up stitches from the thumb part

How to graft/do the kitchener stitch

Cut the yarn but leave a long enough tail (I usually take about 5 to 6
times the length of the seam). Put the yarn on a tapestry needle.
For setting up insert tapestry needle purlwise into the first stitch - first on the front needle, then on the back needle.
*
Now insert the needle knitwise into the first stitch on the front
needle and slip the stitch, then insert it purlwise in the next stitch
but leave that on the needle. Do the same on the back needle - then
repeat from * until there are no more stitches on your needles.

On the stacking of garter stitch ridges - or where to start wrapping and turning
During the first half of the pattern the slope of the MC row goes downwards - that's why I call the CC sections "downwards sections" - the ones in the second half are therefore called "upwards sections".
Each section lies between two markers: left and right. For the downwards sections, the first w+t is at the beginning (right) marker -
because you start on your way back (WS). For the upwards
sections, the first w+t is on left marker (RS).
That means that during the downwards sections you knit the first row
till the end and start the “short row movements” in the second row,
whereas in the upwards section you first do the short rows and only afterwards complete the CC row.
In the following sketch the blue line is the direction of the CC knitting of the first upwards section and the fifth (last) downwards section.

Is it possible, to do it differently and start the upwards section at the right marker - then the stacks of garter ridges should look like this. The difference in the completed mitt should be minimal - the shaping of
the section and the lines made by the MC would be the same, only the
stacks of garter stitch rows will look differently.